Durable and Efficient PTFE Sandwiched SPEEK Membrane for Vanadium Flow Batteries

To overcome the poor cycling stability of sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) (SPEEK) membrane in vanadium flow batteries (VFB), we demonstrate a facile and effective sandwich design by using hydrophilic porous poly(tetrafluoroethylene) (PTFE) films as a stress protective and electrolyte buffer layer for SPEEK membrane. VFB based on this novel sandwich PTFE/SPEEK/PTFE membrane exhibits super long-life properties, which can steadily run (98.5% of Coulombic efficiency and 85.0% of energy efficiency @ 80 mA cm(-2)) with 2.0 M vanadium electrolyte for more than 1000 cycles. This simple and powerful strategy may also be applied to other nonfluoride membranes.